Destroyer Command Review

We're gonna need a lot of help to float this one off the shoals.

Destroyer Command puts you in charge of one of the most versatile and interesting weapons of war. The destroyer (DD to those in the know) is quick and agile with lots of firepower -- the perfect setup for some serious sim fun. The speed and firepower of the destroyer lend themselves to a wide variety of roles -- from ground support, escort, interception and patrol. But the classic image of the destroyer is as a sub hunter, patrolling the waters of the world in an effort to find and destroy the threats lurking under the sea.

If you think that sounds like fun, you might want to stop reading now. For the rest of you, Destroyer Command is an average sim that rarely rises above its disappointing lack of functionality. A failure to live up to even some of the current promises made about the game is hard to forgive and even harder to overlook. Still, the game's not without some positive qualities but you'll have to be patient and persistent to ferret them out.

Sharing much of Silent Hunter II's interface, Destroyer Command is surprisingly easy to pick up. The interface lets you approach the game as you'd like. Super hardcore types will want to manually adjust every single system from within the appropriate stations on board the destroyer. Setting firing solutions for torpedoes and determining depth charge detonation thresholds is actually fun. The sonar's less so but it's still well simulated. Luckily the AI will pick up the duties you chose to ignore.

If the interface has one problem, it's that it has far too many components. Now, I'm aware that this is a simulation and that accuracy is a big selling point. But there's very little reason to visit some of the stations. For convenience's sake all of the engine room controls are accessible via hotkey from anywhere on the boat. This makes the engine room screen little more than a novelty. But even if you get off on switching back and forth among the sonar, torpedo and engine areas of the ship, you'll find that it's hard to jump back and forth from one of these rooms to a given gunnery station. You default to a particular view and a particular gun when you select a gun type. The two or three seconds it takes to get oriented can cost you a lot -- especially when the Stukas are bearing down on you. This makes it a bit chancy to switch back to shooting down planes after visiting the damage control room.

You'll need at least a few of these stations to take on the wide range of duties available for the budding destroyer captain. From single ship engagements to large armadas, you'll be able to take part in battles of various sizes. But it's the variety that's the real selling point here. You'll have to intercept enemy transports, protect your own shipping lanes, provide support for large capital ships and even fire on enemy coast defenses in preparation for troop landings. For me, this is the one strength this title has over Silent Hunter 2. When you're stuck in a sub, there's only so much you can do to help the war effort. But in a destroyer, you'll have all kinds of different tasks in front of you.

The game comes with two campaigns, one each for the Atlantic and Pacific theaters. Each campaign puts you in charge of an American destroyer and comes with 20 missions spread across a variety of tasks and situations. Merchant ship escort in the morning, shore bombardment in the afternoon and sub hunting at night. There's plenty to do here but the individual missions within the campaign are fairly static and progress along the same path regardless of how often you play them or how successful you are in them individually. This makes things a bit too predictable but with over 40 missions, it's not such a big deal.

The same can be said of the handful of historical missions included in the game. They're fun and interesting exercises but they play virtually the same each time you come back. Knowing what's going to happen kills the fun just a bit. The mission generator might open up the replayability of the game somewhat but it too is fairly predictable and doesn't permit you to fine tune the force composition enough for my tastes. If you want to set up a specific engagement, you'll have to continue hoping that Ubi Soft releases an editor for the title.

It's worth noting that while the ship models themselves are fairly well done, the effects in the game are a mixed bag. The wave model is quite nice with a very convincing (if repetitive) motion and there are some slight irregularities along the horizons. Weather effects are toned down somewhat with a heavily overcast sky substituting for actual rain storms. The best effect is the smoke from the stacks as they trail behind your ships. I kind of liked the flame effects and the spouts from the depth charges until I got a chance to see them up close. The flame effects are still pretty decent but the fact that the depth charge spouts are visible through your ship model is more than a little implausible. A few other bugs (like an ocean that disappears in the morning) are present as well.